


bad (at) romance

by tentaclemonster



Category: Night Film - Marisha Pessl
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, M/M, Multi, OT3, Valentine's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2020-02-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:41:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22727794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tentaclemonster/pseuds/tentaclemonster
Summary: Valentine’s Day had never been Scott’s favorite holiday.
Relationships: Scott McGrath/Hopper Cole, Scott McGrath/Nora Halliday/Hopper Cole
Kudos: 1





	bad (at) romance

Valentine’s Day had never been Scott’s favorite holiday. 

When asked why this was, he would give all the usual reasons people gave for holding that opinion – that it was all commercialized, that there was little actual meaning to it other than buying as much as you could in varying shades of pinks and reds, that if you loved someone you really didn’t need one day out of the year to dedicate to expressing it in the most grandiose ways possible, and etcetera etcetera and whatever else one needed to say to sound more rational than they did cynical about the whole thing.

And while all of that was true, the thing that was a little more true but that Scott had never admitted was this: he was not a romantic. 

He wasn’t good at grand gestures and elaborately planned dates. He wasn’t the kind of guy who automatically knew what the best present for a lover’s birthday or a relationship’s anniversary was. He could be romantic, but it seemed that those occasions had always happened by accident – small gestures he made that were automatic, that he hadn’t thought twice about, that he didn’t even intend to be romantic at all, but that still had the desired effect of pleasing the person he was with in some small but meaningful way that showed them that he cared and that he had not a hope in hell of replicating in the future if he tried to be romantic on purpose.

Scott rarely tried to be romantic because when he tried he was never very good at it, and he rarely thought to try at all – a fact that had driven Cynthia to despair and dissatisfaction during their marriage and apparently had also driven her into the arms of Bruce who had all of the romance Scott lacked and then some, something he had only become aware of after Cynthia had already left him. A reasoning she only shared after they’d gotten to the point of being the kind of exes and co-parents who could speak honestly with one another about their past relationship without resorting to raised voices and hurt feelings.

“It was like you just weren’t invested,” Cynthia had told him bluntly when he’d finally gotten to the point where he could ask what went wrong and not feel like the answer was a loaded gun pointed at his face.

And at having finally gotten an answer, Scott had confusedly replied to this bluntness with, “Invested? We were married. We had a kid. We shared a house and a bank account. What’s more invested than that?”

Cynthia then gave him a look Scott was well-used to, the kind of look she’d always given him when he said something stupid, a look that seemed permanently sketched across her face in the time immediately post-break up when Scott was still convinced that the break up was just a break and that there was every possibility it wouldn’t be permanent at all, that Bruce was the phase and not Cynthia’s dissatisfaction with him.

“See, that’s the problem right there,” Cynthia said. “I say ‘investment’ and you think I mean a bank account or a mortgage, like we’re talking about business instead of romance. Well, the romance just wasn’t there, Scott. You could show that you were committed but not that you cared except once in a blue moon and that just...it wasn’t enough.” 

“Why would I be committed if I didn’t care, Cynthia? They’re the same thing.”

That look again, but pitying this time. It crossed the line from what a stupid thing to say over to oh you poor fool. 

“No, Scott, they’re not,” she said, and then changed the subject, apparently done with it. 

Scott hadn’t had the heart to disagree. He didn’t think he’d like what else Cynthia had to say to him if he did. 

And then the subject of his lack of romance had been put on a shelf in the back of his mind for a good, long while. He’d been busy with writing his Cordova book, then even busier with everything that came after publishing. Then Nora came back into his life on a rainy day in March and Hopper in September, and Scott was sunk knee-deep in a new relationship, newer than anything he’d ever experienced before, and since no new accusations of his unromantic tendencies surfaced, he had no reason to think about them.

And then it was February, a week before Valentine’s Day, and Scott had a reason to think about them after all.

*

Hopper was the one who brought it up.

It was late afternoon and they were alone in the apartment – Scott had finished his work for the day on his latest story and Hopper had gotten back from his volunteer position at an at-risk youth center in the city where he went three days a week, the days when he wasn’t going to class to study to become a counselor in essentially the same (but hopefully a more paid) line of work; Nora was still at her own work at the cupcake shop for another hour or two, leaving Scott and Hopper to fend for themselves. 

Fending for themselves on this night meant pizza and a movie on the couch where they’d started off seated next to each other pressed shoulder to shoulder, actually paying attention to the flick on the screen, and somehow ended up in a tangle of limbs, Scott on his back and Hopper on top of him, mouths pressed together, cocks rutting against each other with nothing but the fabric of their pants between them, a separation that was as stimulating as it was frustrating – one that Scott hoped (knew) would get resolved shortly enough.

It was when they’d broken off for a moment so that Scott could pull his shirt over his head that Hopper asked in a voice that was thick with want, “So what are we going to do?”

Scott’s head was swimming a bit himself, but considering what they’d been doing not five seconds before, he thought the answer to that question was fairly self-evident. 

Which he told Hopper.

And which Hopper rolled his eyes at and scowled down at Scott in response to.

“Not right now, I mean next week,” Hopper said, like he thought that was what was obvious here.

Except that Scott didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. He wracked his brain, tried to remember something he already knew he couldn’t, and then finally asked, “Next week?”

The look Hopper gave him could have given Cynthia a run for her money. 

“The fourteenth is Valentine’s Day. It’s on the same date every year.”

This was a fact that Scott was aware of, but somehow he was surprised because, “And...you want to do something?”

Hopper’s scowl darkened. He sat back from where he still straddled Scott, pulling away from him, taking away a little of the closeness. 

“You don’t?” he asked like the possibility was antithetical to him. “It’s the first one we’ll have together. That’s the big one, up there with first year anniversaries. It’s obvious. Nora will definitely be expecting something good.”

“Nora will? She hasn’t said anything about it.”

And yet another look. Scott was batting at zero on this and was sure to be out soon if he didn’t improve.

“Of course she wouldn’t.” Hopper scoffed. “Girls don’t ever say anything about it. That’s not how it works. The guy just knows the date is coming up and he does something about it, then the girl acts surprised like she was never expecting anything to begin with, but they always expect something. You were married, how do you not know this?”

If the dig stung, it was only because Scott recognized it to be true. 

The romance just wasn’t there, Scott. Cynthia had said and – looking back at the relationship in hindsight, at the Valentine’s Days they’d spent (or, more often than not, not spent) together and not being able to think of a single thing he’d done about it that came to mind for any of them – Scott could now see what it was she meant by it. 

And felt more than a little guilty because of it.

“I guess,” he tried mildly, “I’ve never been good at that kind of thing.”

“No shit,” Hopper shot back, not mild at all.

Annoyance sparked up Scott’s throat. It almost made him want to volley back, to say, “Oh, like you’re so good at it yourself.” but Scott held his tongue because he knew it wouldn’t have been fair – or accurate.

Scott may have been terrible at romantic gestures, but Hopper – for all his scowls, all his put-on tough guy exterior, and all the fire he could spit at times – lived and breathed them as much as Nora did, even if he didn’t wear his heart so obviously on his sleeve.

He had a tattoo on his ankle instead, one half of another that was years buried by now but still proved just how much heart he had – a heart that had belonged to Ashley Cordova for a long time and in some ways probably always would, a heart that he now tentatively but earnestly trusted to Scott and Nora’s keeping.

But Scott’s keeping didn’t have a great record with hearts. He only needed to ask his ex-wife to hear about that, and Scott very much didn’t want for this relationship to go the way of his relationship with Cynthia – there were only so many times a guy could get dumped before he started to take it personally, after all.

Nora will expect something good, Hopper said and it wasn’t rocket science for Scott to figure that Nora wasn’t the only one with expectations.

“Alright, point taken,” Scott conceded. He brought his hands up to Hopper’s hips and gave them a gentle squeeze – a gesture of reassurance, apology. “We’ll do something.”

“Like what?” Hopper demanded. 

“Something great,” Scott insisted. “We’ll figure it out together, surprise Nora, and if she doesn’t like it then we’ll do better next year.”

Hopper’s scowl lightened at that, faded to nothing and disappeared, soothed by the mention of next year – a promise of a future together, for the three of them. A promise that Scott knew would mean something to Hopper, much more than anything else would.

And it was a promise he meant to keep.


End file.
